As they approached the Casa del Granger, as Hermione had called it, Harry Potter felt a strange sense of elation. Having spent the day with a knotted ball in his stomach, agonizing over the awkwardness that existed between Hermione and himself, his heart felt suddenly light now that he knew they were on good terms again. As a grinning Hermione opened the door, Harry suddenly remembered that he was going to be spending serious amounts of time with the Grangers, Hermione’s parents for crying out loud!, and would likely be expected to make a good impression on them.
A sense of fear drifted across Harry’s mind like a dementor approaching on a summer’s day. What should he say? Should he tell a joke? No, he was no good at that. Where were Fred and George when you needed them? Regale them with stories of his heroic exploits? ‘Yes, I should remind them of all the times I’ve led their daughter into mortal peril,’ Harry thought sarcastically. As he entered the house and shook the hands of both Mr. and Mrs. Granger (neither of whose names he had bothered to get from Hermione ahead of time, what was he thinking?!!), all he offered them was a polite smile and an otherwise closed mouth. At least that wouldn’t get him into trouble.
But Harry quickly realized that something else was about to. “Mum, Dad,” Hermione announced, sounding to Harry’s ears as though she were about to talk about her imminent engagement or pregnancy. “I’d like you to meet Harry Potter.” Oh, if only she’d stopped there. “The world’s greatest wizard.”
If Harry could have apparated away right then and there, he would have, despite the complications it would create for the ruse he and Hermione were perpetrating. He was certain the shock that registered on his face was as great as when Dumbledore had read his name out of the Goblet of Fire. He rummaged through his brain for something, anything to say that would make the situation better. “That…that’s not exactly…” he stammered, stopping himself only when he realized that he would, in essence, be calling their daughter a liar. After another moment of awkward silence, Harry decided to just make the best of it. “Right. That’s me. You can just call me Harry, though.” Hermione managed some weak laughter as thin smiles appeared on the faces of the two dentists and the four of them hastily sat down to dinner.
The meal was excellent, but the dinner was, well, maybe not quite disastrous, but very close. For some reason, Hermione insisted on explaining why she had called Harry the world’ s greatest wizard, sometimes referring to it as a mistake and other times explaining her reasoning as if it had been the most logical statement in the world. “Well, certainly he can’t apparate or do wandless magic like some older wizards, but he’s not even sixteen yet! He could conjure a patronus at thirteen, which is really impressive and which I’m just now learning by the way, and he’s a parselmouth. Not that that’s such a great power. I mean it’s usually associated with dark wizards, isn’t it? Although Harry isn’t a dark wizard, of course. After all, how could he be? With him going up against Voldemort all the time…”
Harry practically willed Hermione to be quiet and she did fall silent for a moment. However, that silence soon reigned over the dinner table and Hermione’s parents were shooting him fleeting glances that seemed to indicate that they thought he was some sort of combination delinquent-prodigy, so that Harry felt compelled to say something to acquit himself. “Well, Defense Against the Dark Arts is my best subject. We haven’t got our OWLs back yet, but I’m fully expecting an O on that one. I even conjured a patronus right then and there for the examiner. It was easy, as I just imagined that toad U…” He stopped himself mid-sentence. Maybe the idea of a teacher getting fired giving Harry pleasure wasn’t the best thing to discuss with the academic-minded Grangers. “Er, toad of Neville’s being properly taken care of and given a happy home. Hermione’s told you about Neville’s toad, I’m sure. His name’s Trevor.”
No Granger looked like they’d heard anything he’d said after the word OWLs. It was evidently a topic of great interest around the Granger household and both adults seemed to descend on that subject like birds of prey. “How many OWLs are you expecting, Harry?” Mrs. Granger asked thoughtfully. When Harry didn’t respond right away, she continued, “What career goal were you shooting for, anyway?”
“Auror,” Harry squeaked helplessly.
“Won’t that be rather difficult given the trouble you have with Potions?” Mr. Granger inquired pointedly. Harry’s jaw nearly dropped in disbelief, but he managed to hold it up with only a little difficulty. Hermione had told them he was bad at Potions? Did she want them to think poorly of him? Not to mention that they knew doing well in Potions was important to becoming an Auror. Since when did muggles know so much about wizard careers?
“I’m actually not as bad as my grades may make it seem,” Harry attempted to explain. “You see, Professor Snape isn’t exactly fond of me due to…well, lots of things, actually…”
“I told them that,” Hermione insisted as if she were just now getting the opportunity to speak. “But they said blaming the teacher was just what bad students did to make excuses for themselves. I assured them that they would think differently if they’d ever met Professor Snape.” Harry then felt a wave of gratitude wash over him for not making that wisecrack about Umbridge.
Mrs. Granger looked completely unsatisfied with his answers thus far. “So what are your safeties?” she asked with one eyebrow arched.
‘Safeties?’ Harry’s brain asked itself. ‘Am I supposed to know what safeties are?’ As he hemmed and hawed for a few moments, his brain rummaged through everything he knew that had to do with safety: the safety on a gun, safety pins, the Safety Dance…
“So, no safeties then,” Mr. Granger declared with a sigh. Harry desperately wanted to apparate again. Why didn’t he just give up all hope of seeing Hermione again right now?
Hermione let out her own frustrated sigh. “Honestly,” she pronounced haughtily, “even the Ministry of Magic aren’t big enough idiots to keep Harry from being an Auror if he wants to be. He’s faced Voldemort three times now by himself and once with all of his friends and he’s lived to tell the tale.”
“Yes, but others haven’t, have they?” Mr. Granger responded coldly. Harry seemed frozen in place with tiny tingles of shock running throughout his body. “You nearly didn’t just this past year. And that Sirius fellow you were so upset about, didn’t he…?”
Before Mr. Granger could finish, Harry rose quickly, mumbled something really lame about needing to get back to the Dursleys, and fled the place as quickly as possible. He didn’t even realize there were tears in his eyes until he reached the street, as he tried to decide which direction he had come from. He felt like collapsing right then and there in front of the Grangers’ beautiful house in their upscale suburban neighborhood. Why hadn’t he been expecting this? Of course his friends’ parents would see him as a walking disaster area. The scar on his forehead alone practically screamed ‘trouble with Voldemort ahead’. He wondered idly why Arthur and Molly Weasley didn’t hate him for putting Ron in danger, time and again.
“Harry!” Hermione cried, seemingly from nowhere. Before Harry knew it, she had pulled him into a tight embrace. She began muttering ceaselessly through occasional sobs and Harry couldn’t make everything out, but the gist of it was that her father was being an insensitive prat, she was so, so sorry and please don’t be upset. Hermione was usually able to comfort Harry, but as he pulled back from her and looked at the tears streaking down her face, it was hard for him not to let his darker emotions fill him.
“He’s right, you know,” Harry said softly. “In his own way, he’s right. I do put you in danger. You, Ron, Hagrid, practically everyone at Hogwarts. Just by being me. I…” He couldn’t bring himself to say more. Now wasn’t the time to tell her about the prophecy, as neither of them was really thinking straight.
“Don’t do this to yourself, Harry,” Hermione pleaded. “The fact that we’re in danger from Voldemort isn’t your fault. I’m a Muggleborn. Ron’s parents are in the Order of the Phoenix. And Hagrid’s one of the most loyal Dumbledore supporters I’ve ever met. We’d all be in danger no matter what. And we would be in even more danger if you weren’t around. I don’t know why you can’t see that.”
Hermione was right. As of right now, he couldn’t see it. He said nothing else as Hermione quietly told him to get on the moped. She was taking him back to the Dursleys. He had rarely been so happy to be going there.
***
Harry was absolutely certain that nothing could make today worse than yesterday. Hermione’s parents disapproved of him (or if they didn’t, they were the best actors Harry had ever seen). He had no idea whether Hermione would be coming to see him today or for the rest of the summer, for that matter. If the Grangers were truly mad at him, they might even phone the Dursleys and let them in on the entire game, perhaps cinching or scuttling the business deal that temporarily linked the two families in one day. Moody’s threat notwithstanding, he would suffer severe consequences if the latter happened.
Harry slowly dragged himself out of bed after sleeping as late as he dared on a day when he might be spending it all here, under the watchful eye of Aunt Petunia. As he came down to “breakfast”, cold eggs and tomatoes, Petunia and Dudley looked at him in shock. They had likely expected him to have left with Hermione before sunrise. Taking his shrugged answer to Petunia’s question about whether or not he would be spending the day with the Granger girl as a no, his aunt quickly doled out the day’s chores disproportionately between Harry and Dudley. Harry wasn’t in much of a mood to protest and so quickly took to his tasks, thinking bitter thoughts about how this would likely be all he did between now and September 1st.
As Harry was dusting the staircase with unusual fervor, he heard his Aunt Petunia make a strange noise as she moved towards the door. As he lazily turned his green eyes to look at her, she began shrieking like a howler monkey. Harry rushed down the stairs at the same time that Dudley tramped in from the kitchen. Petunia Dursley was clutching a small piece of paper in her hands and her eyes darted furtively from its contents to Harry, seemingly accusing him of something horrible.
Dread filled Harry’s heart. Had the Grangers sent the Dursleys some kind of note detailing what had happened the night before? Dudley tried to peek at the small sheet of paper, but Petunia would have none of it, instead making a mad dash for the phone. Harry leaned in as close as he might dare to the telephone, hoping to learn exactly who it was that Aunt Petunia was calling in such a hysterical panic. Unsurprisingly, it was Uncle Vernon, who sounded extremely irritable and even louder than usual.
Harry couldn’t make out what his aunt was saying over all of the sobbing and Uncle Vernon’s booming voice as it carried across the room (although he mostly said things like “That miscreant!” and “He’ll pay for this!”), but it didn’t sound promising for him. He tried to back away slowly, perhaps avoiding punishment, if only for a little while. ‘It must have been the Grangers,’ Harry thought. ‘They’ve sent something over by post. But how could it have gotten here this quickly?’
Just as he was almost out of the room, Petunia yelled out his name and insisted that he talk to Uncle Vernon. Picking up the telephone receiver as though it were some sort of dangerous weapon, Harry reluctantly placed it to his ear. Before he could even say anything, Uncle Vernon’s ranting nearly deafened him as he recited punishments for Harry that ranged from starving him for a week to shipping Hedwig overseas to an American zoo Vernon had read about. Harry was a bit surprised by just how mad his Uncle Vernon really was; he knew his uncle would be furious if the dentist drill deal went sour, but as the head of the Dursley household was detailing how he would be given exactly one hour to move his things back to the cupboard below the stairs and that he had better be done by the time Vernon got home from work, Harry asked an unexpected question, just to see if his luck could get any worse. “What exactly is it that I did?”
Vernon Dursley clearly had not expected this question from Harry as his sputtering response proved. “I…Petunia said…you…must have done something! It has to be you! Nothing about this business has come up for years! It must be your fault!”
Harry suddenly felt both relief and confusion. Whatever this was about, it didn’t sound like the Grangers had blown the whistle on his already knowing Hermione from Hogwarts. At least Hermione could still come to see him this summer, assuming that was even still possible. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Harry said truthfully. Quickly remembering the paper that had so upset Aunt Petunia, he added, “Whatever was in that message, I didn’t write it, I swear.”
“Of course you didn’t!” Uncle Vernon bellowed back, unimpressed with Harry’s protests of innocence. “But whoever did has obviously been provoked by something you’ve done! And if all that strangeness starts again, so help me Potter…”
“It won’t!” Harry assured him, a bit alarmed at the protective growl in Vernon Dursley’s voice. This seemed to satisfy his uncle, who then proceeded to tell him in no uncertain terms that his punishments would be set once he got home and finally allowed him to lower the telephone receiver back onto its cradle. Still confused and a little shaken, Harry tried to make his way close enough to his Aunt Petunia to get a look at the note. She was still clutching it tightly in her hands, however, so much so that the paper was getting crumpled. Not knowing what else to do, Harry returned to his chores, his mind wandering naturally to the contents of the message and what he might have to do with it.
Harry tried to put what pieces of the puzzle he had together in his mind. He had never seen his Aunt Petunia this upset; she was usually the one who kept calm while Vernon blustered and ranted. Also, while his uncle hadn’t told him much about the note, he had said that nothing had come of it for years and that he didn’t want strangeness to be starting ‘again’, so it must be something having to do with magic and something the Dursleys were familiar with from the past. Harry’s brow furrowed in thought. Things just weren’t adding up. He needed to see that paper.
After an hour in which he dusted everything from Dudley’s room to Dudley’s closet to Dudley’s hidden trunk of contraband (nobody else seemed to want to acknowledge that it existed, so the task was always left up to Harry), he stealthily snuck back downstairs. He no longer heard his Aunt Petunia’s muted sobs or Dudley’s constant protests about his assigned housework, so he felt it was safe to proceed to the dining room. Checking twice to make sure the coast was clear, Harry picked up the crumpled bit of paper and began to read.
The Potter and the Mudblood
Were an extraordinary pair
For meddling and foolishness
They had an unusual flair
Their keeper of the garden
Kept all the flow’rs in bloom
Auburn Summer then arrived
And brought the shroud of doom
Harry’s face went red, his teeth gnashed together in anger and his fists crumpled the paper even more, to the point where the words were now barely legible. Someone had clearly seen him and Hermione together, figured out who they were and had written this filth. The use of the word ‘mudblood’ had always been extremely offensive to Harry, but for some reason now the term really got under his skin. Discriminating against Hermione based on her parentage was just downright idiotic. (The fact that Harry himself wasn’t happy with her parents right now temporarily slipped his mind.)
Harry let a deep frown cross his face as he read the message again. While there was nothing specifically threatening in the verse, it did seem ominous somehow. But how did the Dursleys know what it meant?
The buzzing of the doorbell barely registered in Harry’s brain until the realization hit him that this could be the person who’d left the note in the first place. Didn’t the criminal always return to the scene of the crime? Maybe not, but Harry was determined to answer the door before his cousin Dudley or Aunt Petunia could. Yanking the front door open with his temper still hot, he was determined to give the person on the other side of it a piece of his mind. That was until he saw who it was and realized she had no need for any part of his brain. “Hermione?”